Red
by Thisisnataliexd
Summary: Simple mission, simple people. Until things start going wrong, which happens more often than you think when you're Clint Barton.


The gentle tap of the water was annoying him so much. He would give anything to give up this whole mission and turn the tap off. The tapping persisted throughout the five minutes which seemed like ten, and Clint soon became fit to burst- full of hatred for the man who had left the tap on.

"And then I said: no, Jillian's got the cherry!" A raucous of laughter followed the hearty voice as Clint heard the door to the toilets swing open and slam shut again. A small voice popped into his ear.  
"They've all gone into the toilets. I thought it was women who usually went to the loo together?" Natasha said, her voice was professional yet somehow gloating. They were on this mission together, but who was the head of a drug dealing company going to pay more attention to? Clint Barton, or Natasha Romanoff? An easy assumption could be made.

"Yeah, well, you've got to go in packs haven't you?" Clint muttered, careful not to make himself known from his own hiding place. Which was inside a locked cubicle.  
"If one of your reasons involves a troll, Basilisk, or a bewitched parcel I'm going to kill you." Natasha said, and Clint had to quickly stifle a laugh. But he was unsuccessful.

"Oi, I 'eard summin. Did you boss?" A man spoke, with a thick accent Clint couldn't distinguish.  
"Yeah, yeah, I did. I did 'ear summert." Another voice said. Clint swore quietly, and set a mental note to remind Natasha never to make him laugh while on an operation.  
"You two, cut it out with those ridiculous voices." Someone else spoke, and his voice was greeted by apologies.

Seizing the opportunity, Clint stood on the toilet seat and hauled himself up and onto the small panel that separates one cubicle from the next, as he did so, he kicked the door open. Balancing precariously, he crouched low, careful not to be heard or seen and slithered his way to the end cubicle. Jumping down, he listened as the men slammed open the door to Clint's previous habitat.

"There isn't anything there. It must have been creaking or something." One of the men suggested.  
"Do toilets creak? I know TV's do." If Clint hadn't have known that these people were once world class spies turned bad, he would have wondered what sort of IQ's these people had.

Clint started rustling around, and flushed the toilet, before unlocking the door and stepping out and into the gang of men. He was glad that none of them had questioned his using the toilet rather than the urinal.  
Casually, he made his way over to the sink. As he did so, he put his hand into his pocket and plucked out a small tracking device. Ever so carefully, he attached it to one of the cronies.

The men didn't give him a second glance as Clint walked briskly away from the toilets and back into the restaurant. He'd been to this particular swanky dive several times before; mainly with Natasha, so he knew the place well. He caught sight of Natasha and started to walk over.

Her back was facing him, but her red dress made him know it was her. With an open back, her curly red hair bounced lightly as she laughed at the bartenders joke, and the shocking red of the dress coupled with her astounding figure made her stand out like some coal in the snow.

"Hey." Clint breathed as he walked over to her and settled to stand next to her, asking the bar man for a scotch on the rocks.  
"Are you sure you should be drinking? You are on a mission after all." Natasha pointed out, while raising her own glass of red wine and sipping on it.  
"Well, if I cause a fuss with those guys and they can smell alcohol on my breath, they'll think I'm drunk or something." Clint replied, as he caught an ice cube with his teeth and began chewing it.  
"They're coming back." Natasha said quickly, and she turned away from Clint and sipped her drink again. The men walked over.

"Hello sweetheart." That was Dill. He was head drug dealer, and therefore in charge. However, Clint had his suspicions that the ranking was based purely on who would win in a fight rather than who was better for the job, or maybe the stupidest was top dog? He could never quite tell.  
"Back so soon?" Natasha replied smoothly. Clint was always dumbfounded by the way she could tolerate idiots such as this man. When they weren't in their role as Shield agents, Natasha was as easy to annoy as Steve, but when on a mission, very little could and would phase her.

"But of course, all the quicker for a pretty face like yours." The man cooed, and Clint felt like gagging. That was the biggest problem with these sorts of missions, no matter how much he wanted to, he couldn't simply pull out his arrow and shoot someone in the face. For one it was rude, and for another he'd end up being killed by Fury. Natasha was his girlfriend/spy buddy after all.

"Bleurgh. That is the most sickening thing I have ever heard." Clint said, turning to face Natasha and Dill. Dill look confused, and began puffing out his chest to appear strong, while Natasha raised an eyebrow. She checked to see if anyone was watching before she mouthed:  
"What are you doing?" Clint grinned and carried on.

"How so?" Dill asked, genuinely curious it seemed.  
"It just sounds ridiculously fake." Clint drawled, pretending this was obvious to him, and Natasha smirked as she realised what he was doing.  
"Go on."  
"Well-" Clint started "you have to make a person believe what you're saying." He looked at Natasha. "What's you're name?"  
"Hannah." Natasha replied, intrigued.  
"Right, listen to what I say, and tell me whether you believe me or not."

This went on for a while, and all the more time Dill was becoming more transfixed on Clint's ability to lie. He listened in awe as he soaked in the talent, and Clint couldn't help but smirk as he realised his plan was working.  
"I want to see whether you're lying." Dill spoke suddenly, and Clint and Natasha exchanged glances.

"Sure. Why not?" Clint smiled before speaking. "I am an assassin and I am here with a rather beautiful second assassin. I put a tracker on one of your men and within a few minutes I'll have their exact location, and therefore the location of the drug site. What's more, inside my pocket I have a gun, and the gun is pointed at your head." Dill smiled as Clint's story drew to a close.  
"You're bluffing." He sneered, leaning in closer to appear more menacing. Natasha smirked.

"Riddle me this, then Dill. How is it this stranger knew you run a company specialising in drugs?" Natasha asked. Dill looked slightly put out.  
"For an old MI6 Agent, you're really thick." Clint said, reaching inside his pocket and sticking out the end of the gun at Dill, who gulped as he glanced down it. "Walk."

Dill turned around and started to walk briskly from the restaurant, Clint's gun pressing hard into his back. Natasha brought up the rear, looking around to see whether they were attracting any form of unwanted attention.

As they reached the kitchens (they'd made a detour), Clint slid a piece of garlic bread from a plate that had just been dished out by the chef before carrying on walking. He bit into it as he pushed the door out into the cold open. The force of the dustbin lid against his head and the garlic bread he was still chomping caused him to choke. In the confusion, he pulled his gun away from Dill and spluttered, double over as he coughed.

Inadvertently, he could hear Natasha at work. A thud sounded next to him and he looked over and saw one of the men from the bathroom looking dazed on the floor. After one last almighty cough, Clint straightened up. It wasn't a pretty sight.

Dill had a small trickle of blood oozing along the left side of his face. It was getting stuck in his many wrinkles and spreading out as it soaked into them. His nose was gushing red and dribbled into the mans open mouth. He was gawping at the floor where two people grappled.

Natasha had one of the men in a head lock, and was pressing the heel of her high heels into the crevice beneath his knee. An impossible task in its own right, without the continuing wriggling of the man already. So as not to waste any more time, Clint rose to his feet and immediately side stepped over to Dill. He then pulled out a second gun from his jacket pocket and pressed it against Dills thigh.

"Widow!" Clint called, and Natasha turned to face him. There was unexpected power blazing in her eyes as she continued to wrestle with the man. Clint knew better than to let her continue, otherwise the man would be dead, and their only lead would be Dill. "We better get moving."

Natasha nodded and hoisted the man up by the scruff of his neck. She pushed past Clint as she pushed the other man forward. As she did so, Clint leaned into the man and said "Never try to get into a fight with the Black Widow, she'll knock God himself out of you." He blinked back as Natasha pulled him away. Apparently she'd heard because she rolled her eyes.

* * *

They were back on the Shield Helicarrier. Fury was pleased, but Clint wasn't at all surprised. The man was actually pleased with a lot of his Agents work, but when you're the boss, you can't afford to not intimidate people. Despite his better-than-usual mood (because in no way was it a good mood), he was giving the pair a lecture.

"Barton; you do not play with the targets. You get in, you do your job, and you get out. Do you understand?" Clint nodded grimly. That wasn't the first time he'd heard that. "Romanoff, you don't let him get away with it either." Fury turned to Natasha now, who also nodded. "Okay, you can go." Fury shooed them away and they walked briskly from the large yet cramped office. Clint sighed as the breathed in the air of the corridor.

"It's like being told off by the headmaster." He joked, but Natasha's eyes were focused on something else.

Following her eye line, Clint saw the warning light on the wall. A plastic red cover concealing a bulb. Most of the time this bulb remained off, but today it was blinking.

"No alarm." Natasha murmured, as she realised that the flashing red wasn't accompanied by its usual screeching siren. Clint watched the light and Natasha pulled out her phone. If there really was an emergency, she would receive a message come up on her phone. Everyone working for Shield did. Yet there was nothing. Clint didn't pay attention as Natasha stormed back into Fury's office, to tell him of the suspicious warning light. However, he did start sprinting along the carrier.

The interrogation rooms weren't far away, and he used up very little breath as he ran towards them. That was the great thing about the Helicarriers; they were all one level. As he raced past more lights, he noticed that they were all also flashing, still with no sound however.

He reached the interrogation section, and pulled his bow from his back and grabbed an arrow. He got a feel for it as he stretched the bow and estimated it's weight before gently pushing the door open.

Two men lay dead on the floor. A pool of ruby red blood surround each man and Clint couldn't help but scowl as he spotted the red scissors which had been discarded on the floor next to the balder of the men. Clint whipped around quickly, keeping his arrow poised as he heard a clunk from inside a room. Slowly, he crept towards it. Nudging the door open, Clint dropped and rolled as a hail of bullets showered the air. He poked his arm through the doorway and fired. His estimation he knew was correct by the heavy thud that followed as someone fell to the floor.

"Code Red Herring. I repeat Code Red Herring." Clint didn't know what 'Red Herring' was, and neither did he care as he slipped into the darkened room and swiftly planted another arrow into the mans kneecap. The man swore loudly and fell to the floor. He pulled the arrow from the skin of his knee and bared his teeth at Clint, who couldn't help but feel slightly taken aback at the sight.

The mans khaki cargo pants were becoming stained by a thick red as it seeped through the material, and not wanting to seem the lesser man, Clint grinned cheekily. The man bared his teeth and snarled, and Clint decided that his new name was Dog.

"That's a good boy... Now come here... Easy does it." Clint teased the man dubbed Dog who glowered by way of reply. "Otherwise I'll stick an arrow in your eye."

"You don't frighten me." Dog said, his voice was rasping as he fought off the pain in his leg. Clint could tell he'd done some damage to the ligaments just by the way he was slowly hunching towards him. Suddenly, Dog leapt forward, putting an extortionate amount of weight on his leg despite the damage Clint had done to it. Clint couldn't help but wince. He ducked out of the way as blood cracked hands attempted to grasp at his throat. Dog snarled again.

"Wow. You love snarling." Clint muttered as the dodged a wild punched Dog flung at him. "You want to watch those punches. You might hurt someone." Clint teased. This time, the fist did indeed collide with his jaw.

Clint stumbled backwards, but regained his balance a few moments later and took a double-step backwards against the wall. He then placed his foot on the wall and crouched low, performing a summersault and kicking Dog firmly in the neck with both feet. Dog crumpled.

Clint took in his surroundings as he steadied himself. An over turned table, and a pot plant of all things lay with its soil scattered across the light grey carpeted floor. He was about to call for someone to come clean up the mess, when a bullet narrowly missed his left ear.

In one swift movement, Clint picked up his bow, twirled an arrow around his fingers and planted the head of the arrow firmly in the new figures head. Like the man he was coming to the rescue of, he also crumpled.

Clint stooped low and grabbed a file that hadn't caught his attention before and began fingering the pages. Upon first glance, he realised that the man who was currently lying unconscious with a broken neck was Dill. How he didn't recognise that before was a mystery to him, and he stood looking at the man who upon first appearance in the restaurant seemed like a casual thug, but was now amidst a scene which would have depicted his escape had it not been for Clint.

Natasha and Fury stormed into the room, and quickly went about their business. Fury yelling at random Shield Agents, and Natasha doing the same thing. From now on though, Clint was never going to judge a book by its cover. Or drug dealers, for that matter.


End file.
